


halo

by vatonages



Category: NCT (Band)
Genre: Gen, M/M, Unrequited Love, lapslock, set during jaemin's hiatus
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-01-17
Updated: 2019-01-17
Packaged: 2019-10-11 14:01:39
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,785
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/17448338
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/vatonages/pseuds/vatonages
Summary: when jaemin's back gets injured it's like his world has stopped, but jeno reminds him it keeps turning.





	halo

 

they’re sitting in jaemin’s room, both freshly showered after a grueling day of practice. every day is a grueling day of practice, but jaemin thinks that’s not a fair way to describe it. there’s something to be said for the reward of working with people you love towards a common goal, of finally nailing the choreo and then getting to high five each other and bow to the teachers and show it off to the other trainees, going home for the day knowing you made progress, a nice kind of soreness that comes from hard work, jeno working knots out of his back with kind thumbs.

 

jeno’s hair isn’t completely dry yet, long and floppy from how it’s grown out. it’s dyed black now, back to its original color and  _ this  _ is the jeno that jaemin grew up with. jeno lived in a constant state of needing a haircut for all of their trainee days and it’s comforting to see that no matter how much they grow up they don’t really change too much. his hair smells like jaemin’s shampoo because the one jeno likes to use is all gone and jeno used to ask permission to use jaemin’s things like he was visiting a stranger’s house for the first time but now he just uses them and jaemin likes it better that way. 

 

like this, jeno’s hair spread around his head like a halo on jaemin’s thigh, he thinks he might really be an angel. not an angel, he thinks. he takes that back, because then jeno wouldn’t be in the mortal plane with him. and he remembers angels are supposed to look scary anyhow. unlike humans at all, more like flaming wheels with limbs. humans aren’t supposed to be able to look upon them in their truest form, and jeno is almost too beautiful to look at, not in a way that is scary or formidable, but in a way that fills jaemin with so much wonder his chest almost aches when he looks for too long. in an unbelievable way, like every time jaemin looks away, he wants to look again to make sure he didn’t just imagine it, like he has to pinch himself to make sure it’s real. 

 

but then again, jaemin thinks, jeno has always been different. jaemin has always been extremely affectionate. some (jisung) would say affectionate to a fault, and jaemin has had his fair share of friends push away his advances for cheek kisses and forehead kisses and snuggles and affection of all kinds, and he understands people have boundaries, he gets that, but that doesn’t mean he stops testing the waters every so often to see if their boundaries have changed. 

 

but jeno has never pushed him away. not in private anyway. jeno gets shy in public, puts a hand on jaemin to stop him from giving a kiss on the cheek, from hugging him too long, shyly shuffles away, but it’s always been okay because in the dorm or in jeno’s room or in jaemin’s bed jeno just lets him do whatever. he hardly even acknowledges it, like it’s that normal for him. maybe it is.

 

“you’re going to make my acne worse,” jeno whines one day, when jaemin has delivered perhaps a few too many kisses in a row to his cheek. “it’s already so bad,”

 

jaemin wants to say “everything else about you is perfect. your skin had to be sacrificed,” because seriously, it’s jeno’s only visual flaw, and it still doesn’t do anything to take away from his beauty. it’s maddening. but he knows how upset jeno gets about it, how self conscious it makes him, so he backs off. jeno has very few flaws. allergies, bad vision, and now acne. jaemin doesn’t think those even count. the company will send him to the dermatologist anyway, and it will be a thing of the past. 

 

maybe at one point jeno’s constant sniffling was annoying, his squinting when jaemin held up something far away and said “look”, and jeno wasn’t anywhere near his glasses. his sheepish grin, the way he always said “sorry, jaemin-ah. i can’t see it.”. maybe at one point those things were annoying, but they weren’t anymore, and that was enough to send jaemin spiraling into a crisis.

 

jaemin pushes jeno’s hair back in a way that says “i love you very much, and i hope you love me back too,” but all jeno does is smile. he does that a lot.

 

“things are going to change a lot pretty soon,” jeno says. jaemin’s fingers are still in his hair. “we’re growing up.”

 

“i don’t want things to change,” jaemin pouts. jeno’s hair is so soft. “i want things to stay just like this forever,” jeno laughs.

 

“no, you don’t. stagnation is bad. doyoung hyung always says familiarity is comfortable but change isn’t. we need change, though. things never get better without it,” jeno says.

 

“but they can’t get worse without it, either.” jaemin points out.

 

“you’re so stubborn,” jeno laughs. what can jaemin say? he’s a leo. he laughs too.

 

as it turns out, jeno’s words come true. just not in the way he intended them.

 

* * *

 

 

when jaemin injures his back, or rather, his back gets injured, because the first usage of the verb implies he did it to himself, he is miserable. it means wasted time, boring nights, his joints achy and sore from laying in bed so much, loss of contact with his friends, the smell of a hospital but all the time. it means early morning physical therapy and some group therapy sessions too as he copes with his injury and what his injury means. what it might mean. what it could mean. 

 

“are you okay?” jeno asks all the time, blowing up his phone with cute ryan stickers. he throws in an apeach sticker every once in a while for variety, tries to send kekekes to lighten things up when they both know very well there’s nothing funny about the situation. jaemin stayed up late rehearsing the choreo for their showcase, getting the timing right, the facial expressions. the dance teacher told him he had a glorious smile and he wanted to show that to the audience. 

 

“are you okay?” jeno asks, and jaemin locks his phone without opening the message. 

 

jeno doesn’t stop messaging on purpose. it happens gradually as promotions pick up, as he gets busy with the performances and the practices and getting ready in the makeup artist’s chair. jaemin can’t even be upset. before he ended up in the hospital, he used to be notorious for leaving people on read too. that was never intentional either.

 

“jaemin-ah,” jeno would whine, leaning his head on jaemin’s shoulder. “you never reply to me,”

 

“i don’t?” jaemin would say, digging his phone out of his pocket and opening up the chat log. “huh,” he’d say, seeing the unanswered message. “i answered it in my head so i guess i thought i answered it in real life too.”

 

he visits jaemin once, on his birthday, and jaemin tells him the doctor said he’ll be able to leave the hospital soon. he still has physical therapy every morning at 8 am, his back still hurts every day, but the weather is warm, and jaemin is a summer baby, and he wants to go outside and get some fresh air. 

 

when he tells jeno, there’s a moment where jeno looks so happy, and jaemin can tell he wants to hug him so tight, but then he sees the apprehension, the fear of aggravating jaemin’s injury, and jeno just pats him on the shoulder. that hurts, too. almost as much as his back. seeing how badly jeno wants to touch him but feeling like it’s too dangerous. sometimes jaemin starts to spiral, can’t help but fantasize about the future, and alternate reality where he never got injured. sometimes he’s even jealous, but he won’t let that feeling stay for long. not when it’s his friends. not when it’s jeno. 

 

“when you’re all better,” he says, so careful, “we’ll celebrate properly. for now, i just don’t want to break you,” he laughs after, and jaemin smiles at him. you already have, he thinks. it’s been like that for a while.

 

* * *

 

 

there’s one day where jaemin cries during physical therapy. he calls it pt now, for short. it’s that familiar to him. he hates that his mom can ask him if he’s ready to go to “pt” and he knows what she means. he resents it. his back aches, his whole body aches. his  _ heart  _ aches. 

 

“how do you know this isn’t just making my back worse?” he cries, and the physical therapist tries to soothe him. he’s not good at it. he’s a late 20s something man who smells like the hospital and checks his cell phone too often because he’s got a girlfriend now, and jaemin knows way too much about his personal life anyways. 

 

“i went to school for this, i learned all about it,” he says dismissively, and jaemin just cries as his whole body aches in waves.  

 

“but how can you be sure? how can you be sure?” he doesn’t get an answer. 

 

* * *

 

 

jaemin goes back to school, and it’s the one he went to with jeno and the others, the performing arts one, but the others aren’t there. they dropped out a while ago to focus on promotions, their  _ careers _ , and jaemin had dropped out with them. they planned on getting their geds later on, but jaemin was back in school, back in the swing of things, the normal life of a teenage boy, with hour long math classes and science labs every other day and a gym class he has to sit through with his back brace on while the other kids run around the gymnasium and do warm ups and play basketball. he feels like an alien, and sitting isn’t very good for his back, the therapist says. neither is standing. 

 

it seems like nothing is good for his back. 

 

jaemin loves gym. it’s his favorite class. him and jeno used to dominate when they were paired up and for that very reason they were only allowed on the same team when jaemin had managed to sweet talk the teacher or the person picking teams somehow. he can see the ghosts of their bodies standing on the field still, doubled over in laughter. the way jeno lost all control of his body while he wheezed and he couldn’t gather the strength to throw the ball, all while people yelled at him to toss it over. jaemin feels like he’s in an inbetween, a meld of dimensions of some kind. 

 

he hears a whistle blow and their bodies aren’t on the field anymore. they’re gone. the kids start to head into the locker rooms to change and jaemin can feel his back brace dig into his back. it won’t let him forget he has it on.

 

* * *

 

 

it’s like a compulsion. jaemin wakes up terrified that he’s slept in a way that’s hurt his back, that he’s pulled something. he has dreams about reinjuring himself, that initial pull of the muscles, the pinching of nerves, how it just didn’t feel right. jeno’s concerned face as he clutched his back, the searing pain, how for once he just couldn’t be strong.

 

“i never want to see you in that much pain ever again,” jeno says one day, very seriously. he’s not looking at anything in particular, his eyes strangely empty. jaemin doesn’t think he’s ever seen jeno like this before, like he’s being haunted by something. and it’s not that jaemin thought jeno didn’t care, it’s that he didn’t expect him to be so honest about it.

 

they have this weird game they play. when they’re in public, it’s like they’re trying to convince everyone that the other person likes them more.

 

“honestly, jeno, you’re so clingy. it’s too hot for this,” jaemin would whine, shoving jeno away from him.

 

“you’re the clingy one,” jeno would say back, accusatory, a hint of a grin, a flash of white teeth. “you’re like a koala bear, but you’re not as cute,” and jaemin would gasp-

 

in private, there was never any pretending. 

 

“was it bad?” jaemin asks. he was in too much pain to consider how he must have looked when he went down, if he screamed or contorted his face. he wondered how it looked from the other side.

 

“it was terrible,” jeno answers, closing his eyes, like he can’t even bear to think about it. “i wanted to turn time back and stop it from happening.” he says. “it hurt so much to see you like that,” he swallows hard. “but i just couldn’t look away. i couldn’t leave you for one minute,” jaemin’s back aches then, like it remembers the initial injury, the thing that started all of this, that herniated disk. 

 

“i’m glad it was me and not you,” jaemin says. he isn’t thinking. he rubs at his back through the brace.

 

“don’t say that,” jeno says, too fast. it’s too breathy, like jaemin said something unbelievably awful. it almost feels like he’s being reprimanded. it makes jaemin forget about his back for a second, look up at him. “i wish it wasn’t anyone at all.” jeno says, softer now, as if realizing how he sounded before.

 

* * *

 

 

jaemin has the day off of school, some kind of staff meeting that school is canceled for. he doesn’t question it much, too busy being grateful while his mom laces up his shoes so he doesn’t have to bend over and do it. he’s going to visit the guys at dance practice. jisung has been blowing up his phone telling him how excited he is to show him what they’ve been working on, and jaemin would be lying if he said he wasn’t excited to see it. 

 

he knows it’s going to hurt seeing them do what he misses doing so much, but it hurts more not seeing them. he thinks about what they’re doing right now, what heno’s doing. he must be taking a quick break from practice. jaemin bets he’s soaked with sweat right now, in those ugly camo pants he loves to wear because they’re “so comfortable”. he’s probably whipped his glasses across the practice room several times, somehow being shocked every time.

 

“why do you practice with those on?” renjun asks as jaemin enters, demanding an answer. no one seems to have noticed him yet. jeno looks at renjun with wide, innocent eyes.

 

“i can’t see without them!”

 

“two feet in front of you?! are you that blind?”

 

“i need to see the mirror,” jeno pouts. “sometimes we get farther back,”

 

“then put your fucking lenses on!” renjun roars, and puts jeno in one of his headlocks, but he doesn’t mean it. it’s more of a rough hug, and then an angrily affectionate nuzzle into jeno’s hair as chenle shrieks with laughter.

 

“it was most fun to do it when jisung had his mushroom hair,” renjun sighs wistfully, removing his face from jeno’s hair. “there was just so much hair to nuzzle. i miss it. i miss his strawberry baby shampoo,” jisung whined, wiping his mouth with a napkin, eating his takeout in the corner.

 

“ah, hyung...stop it…” he whines, and renjun laughs. 

 

“wait! wait!” chenle yells, pointing. “is that jaemin hyung?” they all look over, eyes widening in shock for a moment before they rush in like puppies, excited and eager. it’s nice to be missed, to be cared for, to see how happy they are to see him. mark calms them down before they get a chance to break him. the way they’re all jumping up to greet him, their open mouths, their excited hops. they’re all trying to tell jaemin stories at the same time. jaemin wishes he had more arms so he could hug them all at once.

 

“guys, guys,” mark says. “calm down. i know we’re all excited but jaemin is still injured. go easy on him,” they settle down after that, still excited, but no longer to the extent of tackling him to the ground. it makes jaemin so mad. he is so strong inside but they’re right. on the outside he’s fragile. he’s easy to hurt. 

 

jeno smiles at him and sits down in the circle while they all catch up, but mostly he’s just quiet. he listens and laughs but mostly he’s just quiet.

 

“I miss you,” he says later when they’re the only ones left in the practice room, his chin resting on jaemin’s shoulder. his presence is comforting. it feels like they’re back in jaemin’s bedroom, when jaemin lived in the dorm.

 

“I miss you, too. It won’t be much longer now. they said my back is healing well.”

 

“we want you back. all of us do. as soon as it’s safe to.” it’s quiet for a while, just them alone with their thoughts. jaemin sees them again, the ghosts, but this time it’s not just him and jeno. it’s all of them dancing, their forms going through the chewing gum choreo for what feels like the thousandth time.

 

“you seem distracted. upset, maybe.” jaemin observes. the ghosts are gone now. jeno sighs.

 

“it’s just hard to be happy about you being here because i know you’re going to leave again. it’s not easy not having you here. i know that you miss us and it’s not easy for you, but i’m just saying...you don’t see how hard it is here. for us.” jaemin considers that. he’s not glad he put them through that but part of him feels...relieved. a tiny part of him he tried and failed to not acknowledge had been terrified they would get used to his absence, that they would forget about him, that they would resent him for returning.

 

“i know. i almost cried when i saw everyone, do you know that? we’re young...at this age we grow so fast. i feel like i don’t get to see the kids grow up. i feel like everyone is growing up without me.” jisung had gotten so much taller, and jaemin wishes he could have seen the progression each day. 

 

“you’ve grown up a lot too,” jeno says. “you can’t tell because you see yourself every day but...you’ve really grown up a lot. especially on the inside.”

 

“you really think so?” he asks, sitting up. spending so much time at home and at school with little social interaction feels like stagnance. it feels like going nowhere. 

 

“absolutely,” jeno says. jaemin really is crying now. quietly, just quietly. a tear sliding down his cheek without a sound. jeno brushes it away with his thumb. it’s been hard. jaemin tries not to pity himself but it’s been hard.

 

but if there’s one thing jaemin knows, it’s that sadness is always followed closely by joy.

 

* * *

 

 

“jeno!” jaemin yells into the phone. jeno has to pull it a safe distance away from his ear so jaemin doesn’t blow out his eardrum.  _ that’s  _ a problem they don’t need right now.

 

“yes?” he asks, sounding confused. he might have even just woken up.

 

“i’ve been cleared to return! i saw the doctor today and he said he’s been talking to the company and i can officially come back! he  _ also  _ said you guys should probably go easy on me for the first couple of months, but that’s not what’s important right now! tell the others.” jaemin says.

 

“jaeminnie, that’s great! that’s such good news. when are you coming back? when do you move back in?” jaemin hears jeno moving, rustling. jeno is feeding off his excited energy like he always has.

 

“guys!” jeno yells, and the other members come running into the kitchen, because jeno doesn’t ever yell like this, so it must be important. “jaemin is coming back!” hell breaks loose in the background and jaemin can’t keep the huge grin off his face. he hears glass break. god, he thinks. that must have been jisung. and then renjun is yelling. it was definitely jisung. jeno puts him on speaker.

 

“i’m going to move back in in about 5 days. that gives you guys time to  _ clean.  _ i just know the dorm has gone to absolute hell since i left. don’t let jisung hide in the bathroom to get out of it. kick down the door if you need to.” jeno laughs into his sleeve so the sound doesn’t drown out jaemin’s voice.

 

“are you guys going to show me all the cool stuff you’ve learned?” he asks, and gets a resounding “yes!” in response, and they can’t see him smiling but they can feel it. sunny little nana’s smile warming them all the way from his house. jaemin hangs up soon after and he feels different this time. hopeful maybe, for the first time in far too long. he thinks of the flowers that grow in the cracks of the sidewalk.

 

“they’re not supposed to be there, but they’re making the most of it and growing anyways. there’s always a chance they might get stepped on or….or crushed, but that doesn’t stop them. the sun still hits them anyways, and look at them. i mean, they’re beautiful.” mark says once as they’re walking. he gets off on these hard to follow poetic tangents. jaemin thinks it’s a symptom of writing lyrics so often. but thinking about it now he’s thankful.

 

* * *

 

 

jeno gets home and hangs up his jacket, takes his shoes off right at the door, puts his phone on the table. he is tired, and he wants to lay down, get any amount of rest he can, but he tenses when he hears footsteps, freezes in place. 

 

and then jaemin comes around the corner, smiling so big, and it’s like he’s saying everything without saying anything at all.

 

“jaemin,” jeno says simply, walking over and hugging him. there’s a tidal wave of emotion welling up inside of him, but he tries to calm it down, swallows hard. “you’re early.” he says. jaemin laughs. jeno feels good against him, warm and solid. not a ghost at all.

 

“it’s a surprise. i know you’re tired, so go lay down. don’t tell the kids. let me surprise them one by one.” jeno nods, and he’s just looking at jaemin like he can’t believe it’s jaemin in the flesh. he’s back, and he’s staying this time. jeno can’t believe it, and it’s like jaemin can sense that. he walks over to jeno and jeno hugs him one more time, tighter this time, like he’s checking if jaemin is real.

 

and this time jaemin’s back doesn’t ache even a bit.

  
  
  


**Author's Note:**

> hello! sorry it's without proper capitalization. i wrote it without expecting it to actually end being anything i'd post and then it was too much effort to go back and fix it all. anyways the ending is ambiguous but i hope you know it's a positive one :D


End file.
